He told Business Insider: "We’re really not too sure and in fact, that may be a question that doesn’t even make sense because time, we think, started at the Big Bang. So it doesn’t make sense to talk about before if you haven’t got time there in the first place.

He went on to say that one idea centres around "eons of time."

He explained this is when "it looks like time is going to run out and stop and each of these beginnings and ends might be able to be glued together to make an infinite sequence of time."

"So actually there may be something always before the, before the, before the, before the, before the, before the, before."